Mixed metaphors: “Oyinbo don leave us!”

Take I: As you must have heard, there is a good deal of anguish and outrage in the United States arising from the news that some wealthy families have been purchasing spots in the best universities for their children, mostly through illegal methods. In the past, and partly as a way of encouraging others, I […]

Take I: As you must have heard, there is a good deal of anguish and outrage in the United States arising from the news that some wealthy families have been purchasing spots in the best universities for their children, mostly through illegal methods.

In the past, and partly as a way of encouraging others, I have written about children of Nigerian heritage nailing down opportunities in Ivy League schools through sheer and demonstrable academic brilliance, a fact that probably means nothing in certain Nigerian circles.

After all, it is only money, they would say.

We love to buy.  When I say “we,” I refer principally to our army of kleptocrats who, stealing or buying their way into political office in order to lay their hands on the public purse, proceed to convert everything in sight into personal possession and to buy whatever else is on offer out there: islands, businesses, exotic homes, luxury jets.

And we accomplish all that while ruining and running down public institutions and enterprises.  Which is why it is no surprise Nigeria’s electoral commission is in a shambles; and why we do not own an airline; why we have been unable to complete one national rail line in 60 years, and why public enterprises are routinely sold to the rich.

It is only money.   Which is why it would be no surprise to find some rich Nigerian parents listed in the college admission scam.  The only feeling that would be worse would be the anger of the Nigerian students who worked their fingers off to demonstrate their talent.

Take II: The story of Tanitoluwa Adewumi, who has very little grasp of what he has done.

“Tani” is the eight-year old Nigerian refugee who, defying the odds of having just learned to play chess last year, rose from his homeless shelter in Manhattan, New York, to win the New York State chess championship for his category.  He accomplished it all by vanquishing players armed with private tutors and from the best private schools, and without losing a match.

The young man’s family arrived in the US just over one year ago, having fled Boko Haram in Northern Nigeria, after which he was introduced to the sport.

He clearly loves to play.  “I want to be the youngest grandmaster,” he told the New York Times.

President Bill Clinton, lives in the prestigious northern suburb of New York called Chappaqua that Tani had probably never heard off.  But Bill certainly knows chess, and showing his appreciation, invited Tani and his family to his Harlem office.

Russell Makofsky, the part-time teacher who oversees the chess programme at Tani’s P.S. 116, is considerably awed by the boy’s progress.

“One year to get to this level, to climb a mountain and be the best of the best, without family resources,” he said. “I’ve never seen it.”

But days after the story broke, the Adewumi family was on its way out of homelessness, as over $180,000 had been raised by supportive crowd-funders.

“Tani is a reminder…that talent is universal, even if opportunity is not,” said a New York Times writer Nicholas Kristof.  “Back in Nigeria, his parents say, his brilliance at chess would never have had an outlet.”

What is scarier is that even if there were such an outlet, those who hawk and spend government funds, influence or power, or who stand in its corridors, might well have seized it for themselves…AND crushed him!

This is the reason why Nigerian geniuses only seem to flower outside Nigeria.

Take III: You have seen her by now, although you may not have known her name: Success Adegor, the seven-year old Delta State girl spewing defiance on camera against a school system that was flogging and chasing her out of school for her inability to pay fees.

Ms. Adegor asserted she was ready to take as much flogging as the teachers would dish out if it meant she could stay in school.

As it turns out, her Okotie Eboh Primary School I in Sapele had no right to charge the fees.  And the school is physically in such a rotten shape it should not be in existence.

The good news is that a lot of people have come forward to provide the financial support the determined Ms. Adegor required.

It is also instructive that the school and the Delta State Basic Education system has been exposed for the awful quality of their being and their standards.

But it is not news, for this is sadly the nature of most of Nigerian society, often because the funds that are budgeted for services year after year are not spent on those services.  They are hijacked and spent by officials and contractors often in countries where their officials and contractors do not each year corral public resources.

Let it be remembered that Delta is the state that was ravaged by one Governor James Ibori for eight years, then set free of 180 charges of corruption in a Nigerian court.  Tried in the United Kingdom, Ibori went to jail for 13 years after admitting to 10 counts of conspiracy to defraud and money laundering totaling nearly $77m.

For the record, from his looting of Delta Ibori bought: one house in north London for $3m; a property in Shaftesbury for $410,520; a $4.2m mansion in South Africa (for which he also bought a Mercedes Maybach for $407,000); several Range Rovers valued at $792,000; and a $158,400 Bentley.  He almost bought a Bombadier jet.

Ibori is now back in Nigeria, being rehabilitated like a prince by the Muhammadu Buhari government.  Gone is the vow by the EFCC that he would face new criminal charges upon his return.

Is it an accident that the children of that oil-rich state are being chased from schools that are in such shameless conditions a self-respecting governor would resign?  And if a school in Sapele metropolis can be so bad, what are public schools in the interior like?

And what if one wonderful spirit had not conducted an inspired on-camera interview of an outspoken little girl who didn’t know she possessed the voice of a thousand thunders?

Take III: It is almost three years since it was revealed that the Central Bank of Nigeria, breaching official guidelines, secretly conducted a hiring blitz in which it provided jobs for relatives of top former and current government officials, led by Buhari.

But it is the very hypocrisy by which we contrive to enthrone the least talented or motivated among us.

And then, as we travel the world and encounter societies where talent is respected and nourished, “Ah!  Oyinbo don leave us!!”

We betrayed our destiny and are responsible for the stench we blame on others.  You do not have to be a thief to be guilty of refusing to see we can be no superior to the opportunities we give our best talents.

We ignore our neighbors, too: As Cyclone Idai ripped up a part of southern Africa last week, killing hundreds and throwing thousands into helplessness, the world responded, arriving with help in various ways.

Abuja watched on television.

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